Thursday, June 25, 2009

Too shocking. Offensive. Wonderful. Provocative. Fresh talent. Highly Original. These words have all been used to describe the work of internationally known Czech artist David Cerny. His work has been praised, banned, censored, loved, imitated, simply hated, and simply adored.

Today we honor David Cerny for using his intellectual property to produce wealth. Specifically, we honor him for his famous sculptors.

He became famous in 1991 when he painted a Soviet war memorial, a tank, pink. Rejoiced and seen as a cultural moment for the young Czech Republic, Cerny was thrown into the spot light. Much of Cerny's work today remains very political.

Some of his most famous sculptors are the "Tower Babies", a series of cast figures of crawling infants attached to Žižkov Television Tower. He was asked to do this by the city of Prague, but it is seen as a way to change the Communist era TV Tower. One of his other works is entitled "Piss" and is two men peeing onto a small pond, shaped as the Czech Republic.

Recently, his most controversial piece was "Entropa", a pieced commissioned by the European Union. In this peice, Cerny created a work that depicts all the countries in the EU, however, they are not shown in a favorable light. Romania is represented by a vampire, Italy by a soccer pitch with gay soccer players, France is shown only by the French word for strike, and the UK is missing entirely.

Cerny has created problems with his work also. The painting of the tank saw him arrested for vandilism. His Entropa work found him in trouble not only by offending multiple countries, but also for the work not being a collaboration between artists from each of the member states as promised, but rather for being a work by Cerny and his friends.

A slightly controversial choice for today's Hero of Capitalism, we honor Cerny for the joy he has brought to those who follow and like his work and for the new fans he receives from unsupecting Prague tourists who stumble upon his work.

I suggest doing a google image search to see more photos of Cerny's work, it is well worth your time!!